Category Archives: Uncategorized

I seldom do small works but when I do it has proven best to take simple subjects and go for detail as best I can given my style. Great facts about the Kiwi. Kiwi Series, Sliced, Halved & blownup. You can’t see the underlying colors of blue and red but they are there. I then layered the different levels of green/yellow to the colors that you see ontop. Without those colors the greens would be very dull and void of the detail in the dots. You can view and or purchase the poster print at “Kiwi and Strawberries”

Lion statues, Lion’s Gate Bridge, Vancouver, BC. The struggle with color when using grey. White and black are a value of grey. The absorption of all color is black and the reflection of all color is white. It’s a no wonder that these two vales and all the values in-between the two is such a difficult task for me. So now that I’ve decided to add color, what color and how to apply it? When in doubt my answer to everything is color. When I was a kid in a Catholic school, my answer to everything was Jesus. As an artist, my saving grace is color. Grace is a virtue and A blend like a grayish green or red? I believe blue is out unless I replace or add blue to the black. Mostly I do not want to loose the statue features of the stone/concrete.

The colors and shapes are coming together. BC Place, Science World, the Sinclair Centre, the Burrard Bridge and the Vogue Theater. There are several other subject matters on this painting and I’m still trying to work in a few others. I’ve been asked for poster prints which will be available at the end. Lion statues, Lion’s Gate Bridge, Vancouver, BC.

For clarity, I’ve opted to re-start my blog for my most current work of the Vancouver BC painting 4 Instagram purposes. So if you go back to old post you may find some things being slightly repeated but the images will be new. I’ve been plugging along with this painting for the past several months in between tending to business. Now that it’s nearing being more done than not done, consistency and timeliness is front and center. Subject matters keep getting added as the painting progresses. There are so many things to see, do, eat, go, play, explore, wine, water, learn. I know that my last sentence does not flow but the words just popped out with the thought and I didn’t go back to edit. Very much in the spirit of this painting. Included are: Granville Island, Sinclair Centre, The Yale Hotel, Girl in the wet suit at Stanley Park, The big W atop Woodward’s, The Burrand Bridge, Gastown Vancouver Steam Clock, BC Place, The Vogue Theater, Science World, The lions from The Lion Bridge, the Maple Leaf and an Orca. I may be adding Canada BC and the Vancouver Coat of Arms. The enemy is space. Fill it up, fill it up. The original is 24″ x 48″.

Vancouver, BC, Yale Hotel was originally named the Colonial Hotel when it opened in 1889 but has been the Yale Hotel since 1907. The Yale was built to house and entertain the workers at the nearby CPR rail yards. The original Granville Bridge was completed the same year that the Colonial Hotel was opened. In 1909 the second Granville Bridge was completed. So Granville and the Yale Hotel grew together. Granville is another focal point with this painting which I will cover in a different post.

At this time there was little else in this area. Gastown was the centre of early Vancouver’s downtown. Tracking the changes in the Yale can give interesting insight into development patterns in this part of town as the Yale has a curious tie to one of Vancouver’s evolving landmark structures, the Granville Bridge. The original bridge was completed the same year the Colonial opened, the second Granville Bridge was completed only 2 years after the Colonial became the Yale, and its most recent renovation coincides with seismic upgrades taking place on the current Granville Bridge. As this part of Granville grows, the Yale continues to grow with it. The Colonial was a three-storey wooden structure with a top-floor dedicated hotel and a basement used as stables.

Lions Gate Bridge, Vancouver, BC. opened in 1938. It is officially known as the First Narrows Bridge,[1] and is a suspension bridge that crosses the first narrows of Burrard Inlet and connects the City of Vancouver, British Columbia, to the North Shore municipalities of the District of North Vancouver, the City of North Vancouver, and West Vancouver. The term “Lions Gate” refers to The Lions, a pair of mountain peaks north of Vancouver. Northbound traffic on the bridge heads in their general direction. A pair of cast concrete lions were placed on either side of the south approach to the bridge in January, 1939.[2] From Wikipedia

I originally wanted to make this the bridge the bridge that went across the whole upper side of this painting but it was just too tall and the details got lost as a result. I did however find the lines that I was looking for in the shapes of the lions. This lion will be black and white for the most part. The only part of the painting that won’t be dominated by color but rather by shades of grey.

If you want to cut down on your travel time, you may want to check out the Lions Gate Bridge Traffic Cam in Vancouver. Or if you would like a little Hollywood then checkout this video of the Lions Gate Bridge, Vancouver, BC. collapsing in the movie “Final Destination 5”. They really know how to tap into our fears.

Gate keepers, no… Instagram, yes! Gone are the days of having to seek the permission of any curator or art director to exhibit your work. Been there, done that. Gone are the days of knocking on doors or making phones calls if you don’t want to. Never has there ever been a better time for the introverted artist to pave their own way. Every social media platform is tailored to certain demographics. Instagram is quickly moving up on my favorite’s list. to follow my work, you can read here or on Instagram at instagram.com/artbybollwitt